Start of Economic Sanctions on Iran

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“I believe that we will find our personality in case of a 10-15 year economic blockade. When a nation comes to the sense that it is its own duty to provide what is needed, the brains will activate. I consider the economic blockade, which has alarmed many, a prize for our country… the important is that we know that the others give us nothing.” (Imam Khomeini)

The US did not halt its interferences on Iran’s affairs even after the victory of the Islamic Revolution. Upon the Shah’s admission to the US in the late 1979, Iran demanded his extradition to be tried for his crimes against Iranian nation, but the US refused. Subsequently, Muslim Student Followers of Imam’s Line captured the US embassy in Tehran and took the American spies hostages. The students, accompanied by the whole Iranian nation, demanded extradition of the Shah and the US noninterference in Iranian domestic affairs, but the US that its arrogant prestige had been dented committed a host of anti-Iranian proceedings inclusive of freeze of Iran’s assets and cut off of political and military relations. The US desperately had recourse to economic sanction, and economic blockade of Iran by the US and its allies inclusive of Europe’s Common Market was begun on May 22, 1980.